No final decision yet for Mansfield warehouse project

Wednesday

MANSFIELD — A hearing on a proposed 1.78 million-square-foot warehouse project once again drew a large crowd to the Planning Board meeting on Tuesday night.

Hundreds of residents made their way to Northern Burlington County Regional High School to find out more about VA Florence Co.’s application to build a distribution center off Florence Columbus and Jacksonville-Hedding roads.

In 2009, the board gave Margolis Enterprises, of Boca Raton, Florida, preliminary site plan approval for a 1.9 million-square-foot facility on the site, but the project languished for years without any movement until recently.

The return of the application hearing led to a standing-room-only crowd on April 23, requiring the meeting at the municipal building to be rescheduled for a larger venue to accommodate the number of people wanting to attend.

The crowd gathered at the high school on Tuesday night for nearly four hours of testimony from the township’s and developer’s professionals about the project, followed by an attorney hired by a group of residents opposing a plan to steer hundreds of trucks coming to and from the site down Jacksonville-Hedding Road daily.

That plan, developer’s attorney Michael Gross, of Red Bank, Monmouth County, quickly pointed out, has conditional approval from the Burlington County Planning Board.

“This facility runs and accesses from two county roads,” Gross said. “Therefore, under the law the county of Burlington has jurisdiction over our access from and to those two county roads.

“There’s a 30-day-appeal period and to our knowledge no one appeal has been forthcoming,” he continued. “Therefore, traffic issues as far as we’re concerned are resolved in terms of safe access, adequate access and improvements (to county roads).”

Many in the crowd let out a groan.

When George Hulse, a Burlington attorney hired by several area residents, got an opportunity to speak hours after the start of the meeting, he indicated that despite the developer’s representatives' assertions, it’s not a done deal and the board still has a chance to have a say in the matter.

He said his clients aren’t opposed to the warehouses since it will be a windfall for the township’s ratable tax base and has been a permitted use since 1989, but the developer still needs approval from the local board, which can weigh in where the trucks travel.

“They do not have exclusive jurisdiction, under the statute that created the authority for the freeholders to empower (and) create the county planning board,” Hulse said of county board’s approval to allow trucks to enter and exit off of Jacksonville-Hedding Road and the impact to the township.

“You do have some say-so over what happens with those access points and where that traffic goes,” he continued, adding that the appeal period actually may not be over until the applicant is notified of the board’s decision in writing. Hulse said he's has not seen proof that has happened.

Many residents living in the area are concerned about the amount of traffic that will be generated from the site that will have three, 50-foot-high buildings and operate 24 hours a day with about 1,200 employees working in three shifts.

In the original proposal, the developer planned to build a bridge over Craft’s Creek with the intention of sending traffic from the site to Columbus Road with access to Interstate 295 and the New Jersey Turnpike, to avoid using Jacksonville-Hedding Road as an access point. However, the developer’s site plan engineer, Andrew French, indicated the permit it received years ago for the span has since expired and changes in the regulations would make it extremely difficult to get approval from the state Department of Environmental Protection and other agencies for a bridge now.

Not wanting to go through another approval process for the bridge is an unacceptable excuse from the developer, according to Hulse.

If the plan does proceed with access points at Jacksonville-Hedding Road, Planning Board member John Kampo said he’s concerned that once a truck driver puts in a destination in his GPS it’s going to direct them to the closest route, which could lead many to drive right through town.

“I don’t care how many signs you put up there, they ain’t going to listen,” Kampo said as the crowd erupted in applause.

After several hours the board decided to continue the public hearing at 6:30 p.m. June 13; it again will be held at Northern Burlington County Regional High School on Mansfield Road.

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